


Candy Cigarettes

by Draqonelle



Category: Batman: The Animated Series, DCU, DCU Animated
Genre: Insanity, M/M, Mel Brooks - Freeform, Mental Illness, Mindfuck, Multiple Personality Disorder, Prison, Prison Sex, Psychotropic Drugs, Violence, alien - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-15
Updated: 2011-06-15
Packaged: 2017-10-20 10:54:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,303
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/212030
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Draqonelle/pseuds/Draqonelle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Superman visits the patients at Arkham Asylum one quiet evening.  He and the Joker have a long conversation, of all things, Batman.  Superman does not take it well and loses his temper allowing Joker escapes in the Chaos.<br/>Clark feels guilty and everything works out perfectly forever and ever. Except....</p>
            </blockquote>





	Candy Cigarettes

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first DC fic from 2008 I really want to thank [**quiet__tiger**](http://quiet--tiger.livejournal.com/) for the exhaustive beta read. (So many rounds. She is totally cool! And all those that offered their support. Hope you enjoy  
>  There is also Mel Brooks allusions, because Bruce Wayne is a man of sophisticated tastes... yessir. If you can pick out the Scrubs quote you are a bigger geek then I am.

**Title:** Candy Cigarettes (1/4)  
 **Pairing:** Clark/Bruce  
 **Rating:** PG-13 (Though I want to say R)  
 **Word count:** 15218  
 **Warnings:** Drug use, violence, disturbing imagery, and innuendo (Bats and Clowns do not make nice housepets)

 **Summary:** Superman visits Arkham, and finds the Joker behind bars.  He and the Joker have an unusual conversation about Batman.

 **A/N:** This is my first DC fic.  I really want to thank

  
[   
](http://quiet--tiger.livejournal.com/profile)   
[   
**quiet__tiger**   
](http://quiet--tiger.livejournal.com/)   


 for the exhaustive beta read. (So many rounds. She is totally cool!  And all those that offered their support.  Hope you enjoy 

  


  


After parking, Batman placed his hand on the outer door to the Rogue’s Gallery wing of Arkham. When he heard a familiar whoosh and delicate steps behind him, he didn’t turn around. He had come to expect it after all this time. Who else could it be?

  
  


“You know, I think I’m a bad influence if you can’t find anything more important to do than stalk me.”

  
  


“Superman does not stalk,” Superman said.

  
  


“You are right about that. You really think you can hide behind a billboard every time I check my rearview mirror,” Batman said.

  
  


“It’s a quiet night, I thought you would like an extra pair of eyes and hands,” Superman said.

  
  


“It’s quiet everywhere,” Batman said. "You should stay in the administration complex. We’re probably going to have to turn in early. No sense in you waiting around..”

  
  


“Why don’t I just stay behind and make sure no one keys your car?” Superman leaned on it. He hated being patronized.

  
  


“Please, don’t dent it again.” Batman didn’t even turn around, he instinctively knew Superman was touching his car. “You have better things to do than spend the evening in Arkham Asylum. I have some questioning to do, some people to catch up with, and some fires to put out."

  
  


It had been a long week. Batman spent three nights chasing a drug smuggler down. It had been awkward, until Batman saw him try to shoot one of his underlings. Batman interceded and got the man arrested, only to be denied the satisfaction of seeing him rot in jail, claiming temporary insanity. Batman walked a grey area, and on a rare occasion was denied satisfaction, when criminals got off and people wriggled out of the system. The really funny thing about it was that he never really complained about it.

  
  


“Maybe I should come. I can be pretty intimidating. I thought we would do Good cop/Bad Cop on Zarjenko.” He cracked his knuckles.

  
  


“You actually use that term?” Batman looked at him like he was crazy. “Where did you learn to question people, television?”

  
  


“Normally I just ask them politely before I let them back down on the ground.”

  
  


“Mid air, of course.” Batman looked to Superman. “I don’t think I’ll need to be long. I think he’ll be ready to crack on his own. Three days in the Criminally Insane ward of Arkham, sharing a cell block with the Mad Hatter and a guy who has to crawl on the ceiling and eat bugs to survive, will shake any delusions of Diminished Capacity due to Temporary Insanity bullsh-“

  
  


“Language,” Clark hushed him.

  
  


Batman censored himself with a strained shrug of his shoulder. “Falderal.”

  
  


“See, that’s better,” Superman said. “You don’t have to swear to express yourself and make a good point.”

  
  


Batman grunted, “Well, Temporary Insanity is bullshit, people are exploiting the system, but that’s beside the point. A ‘potty’ mouth is the worst thing in the world now.”

  
  


“I just find it ironic,” Clark said in his oratory voice of the all-knowing wise alien outsider he frequently used when arguing with Bruce about law enforcement. “I think that we live in a society that is mature enough to consider mitigating circumstances of crimes instead of just putting everyone in prison. I find hope for the future. But, you see anyone plead Insanity and you always have the same reaction. That they are lying.”

  
  


Bruce shook his head. “Of course they are lying. Temporary Insanity is the biggest con since Ghengis.”

  
  


“I just find that ironic that you can’t understand that.” Clark might have used a passive self-deprecating tone, but Batman was out of line. “You know some people get so overwhelmed that they don’t know what they’re doing,” Superman said. “The Law is there to pro-” a screaming, crying Russian mobster interrupted Superman before he could end their infamous Argument #17.

  
  


They sprang into action and ran inside to see a panicked Zarjenko run out as soon as the doors opened as they entered. The man screamed as five orderlies chased him.

  
  


He looked up at the two guests, and he threw his arms around Batman’s knees. “Batman, you gotta help me. These people!”

  
  


The orderlies grabbed him as he grabbed Batman for rescue. “Back inside, sir it’s time for Meds. Get back to your cell, Mr. Zarjenko!”

  
  


“I was just fooling. I didn’t mean to … yah. I’ll tell you all you need to stop the gang. I’ll turn myself in. I’ll go to the feds! The state, whoevers youse want, just just just...”

  
  


Batman looked at him somewhat magnanimously as the man muttered and clung to his knees, a blubbering wreck. “It’s all right, take a breath. Smoke a cigarette. We can wait for police escort. Although my car is faster.”

  
  


“No, just get me away from those nuts _now_ , I’ll do anything.”

  
  


If a person didn’t know better it looked as if Batman was going to pat him on the back and tell him it was all going to be okay. Zarjenko was a wreck.

  
  


“That took seven seconds,” Superman said.

  
  


“It’s the setup. But thank you,” Bruce smirked.

  
  


“You have to teach me that,” Clark said. “It’s much less dangerous than dangling people over the ground.”

  
  


“I’m sorry, I would have loved to see your Bad Cop routine.” The Bat rolled his eyes at Clark.

  
  


“I was going to be the good cop…” Clark said. “And you were going to be the-”

  
  


Bruce was a master manipulator, and a master interrogator. He could get things out of people. It was more then just the Bat suit, or the jackboots. He could change his attitude with a subtle adjustment; change the attitude of everyone he was with. He could be a convincing morbid psycho, or as vigilant and pure hearted as a white knight, or he could even appear to be the last chance of an old scumbag, but it was only an appearance of course. Batman would prefer to hate everyone, with equanimity and justice.

  
  


Zarjenko thought he made a new best friend as Bruce pretended to smoke with him. Clark felt gauche right now as Batman reaped the fruits of his labor, a complete confession from the mobster.

  
  


He watched Batman’s face curl up in a satisfied smirk. Clark knew that same feeling. That feeling when he had just stopped a volcano and the crowd was cheering him on, or when he looked into the sparkling eyes of a kid whose toy he had just retrieved from the roof. That smug feeling that makes it all worth it, and of course makes villains think that all Heroes are egomaniacs.

  
  


The criminal smoked and spilled his guts.

  
  


Clark wondered what he would have done to Zarjenko. He would have just smashed something with his hands in front of him, like a toaster or a steel girder. Or maybe dropped him 10 stories before catching him. It seemed mean.

  
  


There would be no denying that Batman was good at his job.

  
  


Superman looked at the terrified fellow. Batman couldn’t take his eyes off Superman, listening to Zarjenko’s confession. Batman’s voice grumbled, “Get back inside. We’ll call the police. They will be here to get you out soon enough. I’m sorry but prisoners have to remain in their cells.”

  
  


“You can’t do this to me.” Zarjenko tried to fight the orderlies. “You’re Batman. You save people.”

  
  


“You are the one that wanted to come here,” Batman shrugged.

  
  


“No no no!” the man screamed.

  
  


“Just close your eyes and think of a happier place,” Batman smirked. “Like the State Pen.”

  
  


Batman noticed Clark standing there sheepishly as Zarjenko was being pulled away. The Dark Knight turned around. “I think some of the inmates on Wing D would like a visit from Superman. It might brighten their day,” Batman said.

  
  


Clark would feel better around sick people anyway. That was part of his reputation, visiting hospitals and all.

  
  


“Or they might scream alien and run away. I don’t go there a lot. They’re kind of skittish and I’m a giant Bat,” he said. “The cowl doesn’t inspire a lot of confidence.”

  
  


“Okay, if you want to keep me away from all the cool supervillains,” Clark fake frowned, “I’ll go play with puppies and kiss babies,” Clark said. “But you owe me one.”

  
  


It looked like Batman bit his cheek not to break out laughing. “Always.”

  
  


Arkham was a strange, disorienting place. As he walked the halls, Clark noticed Thomas Wayne’s name on five doors, as a major benefactor, and at one point one of the practicing clinicians. And Bruce’s on every third bench and water fountain. His presence was there, even though he seemed afraid of the place. Even if Batman couldn’t visit these people, they were on his mind.

  
  


He saw a picture of the Wayne family opening the wing some thirty years ago. Arkham was something that was close to Thomas Wayne’s heart. Bruce joked that he was “carrying on the tradition, in an immature and twisted fashion.” Bruce told Clark he sometimes wondered if he would ever grow up into the man his father was, which was a bit of a mystery to Clark. The greatest mystery of their relationship: why Bruce wouldn’t be proud of himself.

  
  


The staff was glad that a celebrity would come down to their corner of the world. They said it would give the patients something to break up the monotony. The staff asked him to walk into the cafeteria around the general population section as long as it was during visiting hours. This part of the hospital was very drab and clinical, but nothing special. The cafeteria was lined up in round tables where the patients sat at tables with name cards. The nurses walked by with pills and medication that needed to be taken with meals.

  
  


Arkham Asylum had four wings: General Population (Wing D), Problem Patients (Wing C), The Criminally Insane (Wing B) and finally, with its own entrance, the “Rogues Gallery.” Superman would not be allowed in there on the other side of those bars unless the building burnt to the ground.

  
  


The patients in Wing D were generally hard to deal with and exuberant, but they could be medicated, went to their therapists and obeyed the rules. Some of them would return to their families or halfway houses or rehab, or if the circumstances were extreme be retried in a court of law.

  
  


There was a line forming in front of the food serving area with a monitor who made sure no one made trouble. No one really would have the guts with a famous crime-fighting alien on the premises. This section of patients was too small.

  
  


However, this cafeteria served more than one wing of the hospital; it handled both C and D, namely all the patients who still could be housed with other people with no negative effects. The wings C and D were separated by heavy bars and tempered glass, and heavy steel gates which doubled as cells.

  
  


From the other side of the bars in Wing C, there was a constant barrage of arguments, swearing, cussing, and crying, and chaos rumbled. The patients would never take their medication, and were forced to sit in long rows at long rectangular tables. A few reformed villains gave Superman x-rated vile looks of hate. These people would either be returned to the general population where Clark was wandering now, or be sent directly to prison.

  
  


There was even more to this hospital that Clark wasn’t introduce to at all. A few walls down, Clark could scan with his x-ray vision, was Wing B. It was not open to any of the public, and had its own service staff, forced to go in and out by security checkpoints, and its own service elevator. Batman probably couldn’t break into there easily without the codes and a schematic. Okay, but average criminals couldn’t break out. These were dangerous offenders, lifetime criminals and those at highest risk to break out and do crime. Killer Croc was there this time, with five armed guards. They had him muzzled like a dog. He was surprisingly tractable with enough medication, and hadn’t figured a way out of a steel cage in seven months… He probably would one day.

  
  


Then last of all, the Infamous Rogues Gallery, Wing A. They had their meals brought to them by the staff. They were the sickest, the most infirm of character and morality. Arkham tried to keep them locked away from humanity. They would have buried them underground if possible. The patients here never saw anyone unless they escaped.

  
  


Superman stopped scanning the building and set to his task, trying to ignore the rumble of the other wings. Other than a few terrified D-list kooks who called themselves villains who thought that he had come to beat them up (and one man with tinfoil antennae who he had never met but claimed to be ‘on to him and his scheme to steal his brain’), most of the patients were glad to see the famous Superman. He got a hard hug from one of the inmates, a developmentally challenged giant whose parents had died and in Clark’s mind acted like an excited eight year old.

  
  


There were many questions about aliens. Clark tried to stay positive, and tried to refrain from telling any wild stories that would over stimulate their imaginations. Last thing he needed to tell people about was his adventures with time travel, credible stories like how he almost died fighting dinosaurs, or when Jimmy Olsen turned into a caveman. A bland-looking girl with a shaved head asked, in a sincere and quiet voice, when “they” were coming to pick up the “chosen ones” in the mother ship. A man with thick broken glasses said he read all the Superman stories in the _Daily Planet_ , and asked if Lois Lane was still his girlfriend and what size feet she had. He should have been more concerned that he was the one taking copious notes.

  
  


These were harmless eccentrics who couldn‘t survive in the outside world.

  
  


While taking in the sights, Superman came to the end of the public area to an area sectioned off by plastic walls, more like a classroom than a hospital. Wings C and D of the hospital were still separated by heavy iron bars, into two sides. The side he was on was for the general population. On the other side was something else far more unsettling.

  
  


The partitioned rooms, unlike the cafeteria with hate-filled prisoners, were empty and serene. It reminded him of the giant classrooms of his high school for some reason. Only people weren’t supposed to be there and there was a giant steel gate down the middle of the room. After being in a throng of the insane, Superman could use a breather. He thought he would be alone, but soon he heard something on the other side of the bars, in Wing C.

  
  


“Well, well, well. If it ain’t Superman? You have a lot of nerve calling yerself that now! Man…. You ain’t no Man! You-”

  
  


Superman turned around to the voice but no one was there. He looked around. He thought one of the Wing C patients was hassling him from behind the bars, where it seemed safer. But no one was there. It was dark in the partitioned cell, and it would take Super-Vision to see everything, so he flicked on his vision. After a moment, Superman saw that it wasn’t his subconscious ham-handedly insulting him, but a doll, a marionette in the corner, dressed like Al Capone with a fedora and a tiny little asylum uniform. The doll rested on the table, facing away from a little man.

  
  


"Leave... Leave him alone--- He's just..." The little man sat at a table on the other side of the bars, almost in the dark except for a book light. “Dr. George said that I was good and I could bring my book into one of these empty rooms and have some cookies and read my book, if I didn’t make any noise.” He practically chanted to himself, rocking. Superman could see him through the bars.

  
  


            “He‘s a freaking ‘mo. I‘m gonna stop calling him that and call him Super Fairy. How do you like that, Super Fairy?”

  
  


"Hello, Mr.… Wesker." Clark said. He could remember reading the file. Arnold Wesker. A real live Multiple Personality Disorder. Though many of them had shown up in Gotham over the years, Superman couldn’t believe such a disease existed outside of bad comics and his mother’s soap operas. Arnie Wesker was a cursed one in a billion, perhaps.

  
  


Superman tried to be as civil as possible. “I don‘t mean to disturb you, but you should really watch what you… your friend says.” The guy himself was a harmless man, but his Multiple Personality Disorder had allowed him a chance to focus his immense intellect, and put every vice into his degenerate puppet side. His other persona, Scarface, had reached the heights of the Gotham City underworld. It was creepy. He half expected to turn around and see that the guy was making fun of him. But his identity was completely split.

  
  


“Dr. George said if I go into the cafeteria I could have some cookies if I didn’t make any noise,” the man said.

  
  


“Well, I really don’t think that you realize it,” Superman said, his jaw line tight, “but your puppet is being a nuisance.” He was disturbed by the hateful invectives of the puppet rather than fascinated by the man.

  
  


"Look who decided to show his ugly mug, you wanna start something? Start it with me,” the puppet’s disembodied voice sneered.

  
  


“Quiet, Scarface. We’re trying to read the Bible. So, just please leave Superman alone. He‘ll be gone any second.”

  
  


“Don’t you tell me to shut up, Dummy,” the dummy’s voice growled. “You think you’re any better than he is?”

  
  


“Don‘t pick fights, Scarface. Please. He‘ll tell Batman and then…”

  
  


“So what. That Bat doesn’t have the marbles to face me. He’s probably got them in this Superfairy’s mouth.”

  
  


“Oh, please. Superman is gonna kill us.” Arnie was on the verge of tears.

  
  


“Don’t worry. I’m just. I won’t-” Superman took a deep breath. “Just read the Bible and I’ll be on my way.”

  
  


“Cut and run on us, Man of Steel? They finally put you where you belong. Locked behind bars. What’s a matter? A no good illegal alien taking the jobs away from American flying superheroes. Acting up. Acting like they’re better then me. I‘m Scarface. It’s bad enough I’m in here when I got shit to do. But they let this mook come and gawk at me.” The puppet spit. “You belong here. I could own this town…”

  
  


Superman shouldn’t be so upset that a puppet doesn’t like him. He was glad he was smart enough to remember that it was only Arnie’s personalities and not a real little wooden man. Especially ‘cause he wasn’t moving.

  
  


Superman faced his attacker(s’) accusations. He noticed that Wesker was holding something that looked like another doll in his lap. A monkey doll made out of a sweat sock. He remembered his great aunt Monica tried to make him one for his 13th birthday.

  
  


"Now now, chaps, no need to be cross,” the sock monkey on the Ventriloquist’s lap said in a British accent. “Let’s all finish this chapter and leave Mr. Superman alone. He has the right to choose what kind of life he leads. Superman does so much good for the world, you must still admire him." The monkey moved his mouth. “He does God’s work.”

  
  


“Scarface. He‘s gonna hit us if you tease him like that.” Arnold hid his head. “And then he’ll tell Batman.”

  
  


“Batman can kiss my splintery wooden ass,” the puppet spat.

  
  


Superman shook his head. “Look, Arnold. I would never hit you if you didn’t do anything wrong. But your puppet… You shouldn‘t defend your puppet. He can‘t say those things, otherwise you are going to be stuck with him in prison or in Arkham forever.”

  
  


”And God will forgive those who are willing to give up their evil ways. Have you heard the Good News, Mr. Superman?”

  
  


“Yeah. It was pretty good.” Clark scratched his head.

  
  


“God forgives and heals your sexual perversions,” the monkey puppet said to Superman.

  
  


"Sexual perversions. Arnie, you are in a puppet ménage a trios with Al Capone and a sock monkey,” a voice rang out from the hall. “Pot, meet kettle.”

  
  


Clark turned his head to the approaching figure, coming from the light into the dark area. The patient seemed seventeen feet tall and his voice cut through the chaotic mad mumbles with its sharpness.

  
  


Arnie held his monkey closely, protectively. "He's not just a sock monkey, Mr. Joker. Monsignor Mapplethorpe is the Archbishop of Monkeyburg!" the Ventriloquist said, holding up his stuffed toy.

  
  


"Arnold, now, be nice. Sticks and stones will break your bones…" the sock monkey said.

  
  


  


The Joker stood in the doorway of the room that Arnie was in, flanked by three guards.

  
  


“Mr. Wesker, could you clear out of here? Once we get the security cameras in place and the lights up Patient J is going to be housed here in Level C in this surveillance area, separated from the other patients until his cell is fixed.” It didn’t make sense that they wouldn’t put him a private cell. But maybe it was necessary. It was easier to monitor the area than a private room on Wing C, in front of all the cameras and the steel bars locking all the patients in. The officials at Arkham had tried to use a medium security cell with precautions, but those rooms were only on the fourth floor and had windows and the Joker was not afraid of scaling the heights using a small homemade ladder or even jumping.

  
  


“The Joker, that jerk off,” the wooden puppet grumbled. “Like I need another Fruitloop in my face. I was here first. Dummy, you better not be responsible for this fuck up or I will kick your ass too.”

  
  


“Scarface, why do you blame everything on me?” Wesker whined, reaching out for the puppet.

  
  


“Good to see you, Scarface, Mapplethorpe.” Joker shook the puppet’s hand, as if he was really a part of the conversation. “How you doing, Dummy?” He rubbed Arnie’s bald head.

  
  


“Ease up there. No contact with fellow inmates until Dr. George says so.” The guard hovered over Joker. He was extremely nervous.

  
  


Supermen noted that Joker was shackled at the wrists, instead of using mere handcuffs, so he couldn’t slip them off his wrists or touch his hands together, and could only leer through those bars of the steel gate. The Joker had an armed guard by his side of the bars with a Taser and a tranq gun. The whir of cameras in the corner indicated he was under the best surveillance they could provide right now. And Superman was right in front of him. What would he try?

  
  


The guards were large physical guys, experienced working with criminals and psychotics, and phased in and out of the conversation. They were able to ignore the constant barrage of insane monologues. They stood by, quietly focusing on the Joker’s movements.

  
  


“Didn’t you hear, Mr. Joker, about Atman-Bay and Uperman-say?” Arnold asked.

  
  


“Hear about it? I thought I started that rumor,” Joker said, looking confused. Joker came right into the room, and he and Superman had never been closer. “But it bears repeating.” Joker smiled at Superman.

  
  


Scarface spat he was so angry. “If there was any way I could hate the Batman more, it’s this. That smug pole-smoking sonuva bitch…. No wonder he lives in a cave with boys.” Scarface growled and snarled.

  
  


“I feel ya,” Joker addressed the puppet. “But don’t think he did it to piss us off. Can you imagine the great personal depth of pain to keep a secret like that?” The Joker patted Scarface on the back, affectionately.   “You know if I had to live with such stress, I’d fucking punch a guy in the throat. Although then I would have had a reason to do what I did to the man at the coffee shop last month. It would have been less funny, but still he might have appreciated it more…. Good times,” Joker confided in the puppet. “And the good Bishop Mumblety Peg says, ‘Judge not lest ye be judged.’”

  
  


“Mappletorpe, sir. Well, like the Good Book says….”

  
  


Joker groaned and picked up the monkey, stealing it from Arnold. “Blah blah blah. Blaha, lots of crap that doesn’t work in reality. Levitijohn 12:13. Amen.” He brought the Monkey to his face.

  
  


“You can’t do that!” Arnie panicked.

  
  


“You can’t do that.” Joker mocked him. “Evangelizing Monkeys are worse then the Rastafarians. I can‘t take it anymore.”

  
  


Joker started playing with it. "Oh, look now, your monkey can FLY! He’s filled with the Holy Spirit. Hallelujah!" He launched the monkey high through the air towards the ceiling.

  
  


The guards tried to spring into action and stop him but Joker wriggled away.

  
  


"Mr. Mapplethorpe!" The Ventriloquist raced after his puppet. He was having a breakdown. 

  
  


“Come now! He’s apotheosizing! It’s the Monkey Puppet Rapture!” Joker played Keep Away with the monkey. “Take him, Jesus, he’s ready.”

  
  


“He’s not! Stop it!” Arnie clambered and howled.

  
  


“Praise Jesus!” Joker bellowed.

  
  


“You two get down now!” The guards gave them a verbal warning.

  
  


“YOU’RE KILLING HIM! Give him back. Give him back!” the man screamed his head off.

  
  


"Hahahaaha," Scarface the marionette laughed. "Take that, Mapplethorpe, you stupid monkey. Look at how useless that dummy is.”

  
  


“Leave him alone,” Arnie cried to Joker.

  
  


“Help, I’m doomed!” the monkey screamed.

  
  


Joker threw the monkey through the bars onto Clark’s side of the cage. Superman actually jumped back. He didn’t know if it was rigged to explode.

  
  


“Monkey! MONKEY! MONKEY!” Arnie screamed, trying to break through the iron bars and set his puppet free. His eyes were crazy red and shining as the Joker laughed.

  
  


It was hard to filter out all the screams and the chatter and the encouragements that Joker was supplying Arnie to act up, urging him to freak out even more than he already was.

  
  


The orderlies managed to subdue both of the patients. Soon two guys were holding the Joker down, and Arnie was on the floor on his back yowling like a child.

  
  


Was this what it was like in a crazy person’s mind? It would like be if he turned up all his superhearing to hear every voice in the city shout at the top of his lungs.

  
  


“You gotta save Mr. Mapplethorpe, Superman! He’s all I have!” Arnold cried.

  
  


Superman grabbed the monkey from off the floor, feeling so helpless. This man was trapped in the chaos of his mind and would be in the asylum for the rest of his life. “No no no. He’s fine. He just fell on the floor. He’s…” Superman bent over to pick up the toy. He held him up.

  
  


“Superman, you saved him!” The little strange man had tears in his eyes. “You’re a hero.”

  
  


“Bless you, Superman, and all you do!” the monkey said to Clark.

  
  


He handed the monkey to the little man. “Here you are, don‘t lose this one.” He wished he could launch that Scarface into deep space to that lovely planet of lava and intelligent cultured termite people he had been to a few years ago.

  
  


The Scarface puppet sat silently for a while as the monkey puppet spoke kindly to the little man as he petted his puppet.

  
  


That was the last possible thing that Superman could ever do to help, it felt so petty and insignificant. A child could have done it.

  
  


Superman knew why he hadn’t come down here to Arkham before.

  
  


The orderlies began to try to calm Arnie down and drag him back to his room. “We’re just a little over stimulated by all the people. Come on, Arnie.”

  
  


“Don’t forget me!” Scarface shouted.

  
  


“I don’t want to talk to you, Scarface. Leave me alone,” Arnie said to the puppet. Trying his hardest to drown the noise of his alter ego out of his mind. Some small justice.

  
  


Superman wiped off his hand. It was Arnie’s chance to fight evil now. 

  
  


The first orderly cleared out Wesker and his puppets. Two more remained, pacing uneasily. Arnie could be a handful.

  
  


"Thank you for getting rid of him.” Joker smiled as the other orderly pinned his arms back. “Whew!” Joker laughed. “Arnie used to be such a blast. Drinking all night, making crack out of baking soda, cutting himself, telling these screamingly funny stories about getting gang banged in juvie every night for six years. I nearly split my sides. When he told the group about how his mother tried to drown him, milk shot out of my nose. And when that stupid puppet bitch smacks him around, it’s a riot. Isn’t it a riot? Who said that ventriloquists aren’t funny? I think they’re funny.” He laughed. “The second he stopped taking crystal meth he turns into a freak.”

  
  


            Joker kicked Wesker’s Bible under the door. “We get rid of this.”

  
  


            The guard held up his Taser. “You stop that. We are not messing around,” he shouted at the Joker. “You are not allowed to speak with other patients or visitors until Dr. George reinstates your privileges. You are going to sit there and behave,” the orderly reminded him. The chain on the shackles had too much slack. The orderly took the shackles and attached them to the steel bars on the door, by the chain so he couldn’t leave the room. He could only pace around two or three steps. He couldn’t use the chain as a garrotte either, since his hands were in the sturdy steel contraption. Even with the guards and orderlies right there.

  
  
  
  


            The Joker squirmed and bucked, but the sedative found his leg and he slumped down, unable to hold himself up. Joker wouldn’t be able to run with that much juice in his system.

  
  


            Joker closed his eyes in an act that sort of resembled surrender. The remaining orderlies disengaged, letting the drug settle him down, and went after Arnold.

  
  


            Superman thought that staring was impolite so he always tried to stop himself, but as Joker opened his eyes and started looking at him he couldn’t help staring back. They had used some sort of muscle relaxant so he was still alert and awake. He looked sick today. Teeth looked too yellow next to bone white skin. His eyes were deep set and a bit limpid. If they weren’t swirling with madness, he might have called them big brown puppy dog eyes. It was too strange. His hair looked like a chlorinated pool with self-done green highlights, like ribbons. Superman wondered if he had gotten hair dye on the inside. And where he had gotten make-up. The man wore make-up the color of lead white on his face, perhaps an homage to the actors of ancient yore who had contracted lead poisoning leading to a madness this mad genius had refined, or perhaps just for the striking visual effect.

  
  


            He wasn’t born sickly looking. Clark was surprised how most of his face was fine-featured, and delicate. A strong jaw with a girlish heart shaped chin with one dimple. There was some kind of accident, involving a factory, a fire, or chemical burns or something. Make-up an inch thick couldn’t cover the problems with his face. On one side was a charming dimple and the cupid’s bow of full lush lips; but the other was slashed by an x-shaped scar. The texture of his skin was meaty and scarred, but colored powder white like someone had painted the dirty ground. The most disturbing thing under the slash of red he put over his lips was that he hadn’t just painted his lips red; he painted over the skin where his lip should have been. It was missing because of the scars. He had painted on his own face.

  
  


            The pretty features were more frightening than they should have been, compared to all those scars.   His face seemed like an obscene joke.

  
  


“Mr. Superman. We gave him a sedative, to moderate his behavior while he’s out of his cell. Will you watch him while we get Arnie back to his room? We’ll only be ten minutes.”

  
  


            “I will do my best,” Superman said. At least with the Joker subdued and injected the chaotic part of his trip was over. He had dealt with the Joker before. He even sent the Clown here on a few occasions when Batman needed help.

  
  


            “There was an incident of arson in his cell. We really are investigating the situation. Batman is around trying to make sense of the crime scene,” the guard said. “We think…” Superman nodded. _When Batman said he had fires to put out in Arkham, he was being literal._

  
  


            The head guard addressed the doped up Joker. “You sit down there,” the guard said to the Joker, rattling the bars on the steel gate with his nightstick. There was a blue line drawn on the floor down the middle of the partitioned cell. “You do not cross this line to attack Superman or you are going back into solitary confinement,” the orderly said. “Dr. George’s orders.”

  
  


            “It’s okay. He’s not bothering me, guys,” Superman said. “He’s just a criminal. They like to hear themselves talk.  I just ignore him.”

  
  


            “Nice to see you again, Superman. You rock. Come back anytime. There is no need for us to worry with this guy around.” The guard pointed proudly at Superman. The guard tried to high five him but Superman shook his hand instead. The guards all left the room..

  
  


            Superman nodded. He spoke to their departing backs, “I just hope I don’t get in the way.” The guards thought they could take a break with the most important superhero in the world in the room. Superman tried to remember who he was as he watched Joker on the ground.

  
  


            Even incapacitated Joker might gambol free. He was dangerous and unpredictable. The situation was unfamiliar and risky. Superman had learned to be nervous around the quick more than the strong over the years. There was something casual and powerful in the way that Joker moved, even when not moving.

  
  


            His eyes were still awake, but that could have been a result of using such a potent muscle relaxer instead of narcotics. He would be awake the whole time. Superman stared intently until…

  
  
            "I thought those dicks for brains would never leave.” The Joker immediately sat up. He tried to stand, but instead stretched out his foot over the line and stuck out his tongue, in a gesture of pointless defiance. It was less then three feet from where the Joker slumped.  
  


The Joker was a thin figure, dandyish in proportion, but absolutely deprived of fat or bulk. He sat confidently, crossing bone-thin legs with an arch to his back and a dancer’s grace. 

  
  


            Despite the fact he had extremely expressive brown eyes, the Joker’s facial expression stayed just about the same: full of scorn and contempt and evil glee. It could have been the grimace he painted on his face, or his furrowed brows. It could have been that it was difficult for him to move the muscles on the right half of his face. Who knows? He gave his permanent smirk to Clark, sat there looking down his nose on him. A criminal in an insane asylum, chained like a beast, still possessed a sense of arrogance. Clark began to wonder if the Joker knew something he didn’t and it set him ill at ease.

  
  


            “They’re letting you out of top level security?” Superman asked. He couldn’t believe he was sitting in Arkham talking with someone so dangerous in broad daylight, even drugged and handcuffed to the bars.

  
  


            “For a little stroll among the hoi-polloi,” the Joker said. His verbal skills were up to par. It was hard to believe they had just injected him. Superman was no psychiatrist but wasn’t he supposed to be only semi-conscious right now? “I’m here to visit my friend Arnie until they fix my bachelor pad. I tried to hang up a swell picture of Elvis Presley in black velvet I bought. Well, someone replaced my Putty-Tak with C4. The whole wall went and I just laughed and laughed.”

  
  


            “How did you get plastic explosives into your cell?” Superman asked.

  
  


            “Internet.” Joker shrugged.

  
  


            Superman was confused. “How-- ”

  
  


            “I’m not supposed to be talking with other people until they fix my cell. I’m enjoying the chance to stretch my legs.” The Joker couldn’t make very dramatic gestures hobbled like this, but energy exuded from his face as he sat on the floor. The sedative didn’t really seem to be working.

  
  


            "So here is the hero who’s dating Batman. I guess that makes him Fruitbatman, The Flying Fox of Gotham. Meow." He pulled himself up into a different position as he sat. "Congratulations are in order to the happy couple. I thought I was being trendy. Like the Will and Grace saying, you two were an item. I guess I‘m psychic. You are an item… for now.”

  
  


            "I don't discuss my personal life with supervillains. It's not my style. And Batman wouldn’t like it.” There was no way he was going to let a psychopath like the Clown Prince of Gotham get under his skin about Bruce. Or give Batman’s enemies any more attention. This blatant homophobia was something that Superman didn't let affect him in uniform.   There were many pathetic people in the world always looking to blame those who were different. He would never forget that when people tried to bring him down, and tried to ignore their blatant ignorance and stupidity.

  
  


            Since he and Batman began their relationship, they couldn’t hold everything in check anymore. They were more in tune in battle, argued more and were more expressive with each other. They did not play around in uniform. That was one of Bruce’s few stipulations. The JLA started uncovering the mystery with amusement and a lot of respect, happy their comrades had found each other. That didn’t make it easier for them to get along, but their colleagues always gave them a wide berth. Soon rumors circulated into the closely knit and insane community of supervillains.

  
  


            Ironically, the villains were not surprised and didn't care as long as they could still strap them to a Phaser Cannon. Villains were selfish, sensual and megalomaniacal generally, and didn’t consider anything past their own nose. It became little more than a running gag, like the Flash having a big mouth or the Green Arrow being pussy whipped. Who would have thought the public they protected would be less tolerant then their whack job enemies? The whole world was in denial, it seemed, and it wasn’t something that Bruce ever wanted to talk about with him. Bruce was too determined to let things like that throw him off his game. Bruce invented the word macho.

  
  


            "Now, now, Superpansy.” He gave a little grunt as he propped himself up against the wall to sit. His arms stretched out in front of him and to the left. He let out a grunt as he settled. “I'm not one to judge. I don‘t destroy people because they are gay and like to have a lot of sex. I‘m not the Catholic Church,” he said. “Just tell me, do you have to wear little silk boxers with bats all over them, or has he got over that possessive phase?”

  
  


            “I don’t wear Bat-shaped boxers.”

  
  


            “I hardly think you would look good in a thong, with those chubby thighs.”

  
  


            “I am not talking to you,” Superman said. “Now sit down and stop making fun of me, you homophobic…”

  
  


            “Homophobic. Harrumph. I’m way more gay than you.” Joker snorted at him contemptuously. “I'd been on the inside three times before Bats and I began our little fling, since I was 15. I've had my share of vanilla pudding." He licked his fingers.

  
  


            Superman turned his head. He wasn’t going to be able to look Joker in the eye again without thinking about his wet finger making that popping sound from between his lips.

  
  


            "The magnificent Dr. George decided that we all in the Rogue’s Gallery should focus on all the dark little secrets and boring little tragedies before we all met Batman. My mind can't help but reflect on those early days when I hear that no talent hack prattle on and on about coming to terms with the past. So many memories."

  
  


            Superman continued to try to pretend he wasn’t there. But Joker would not tolerate being ignored. It was not an endearing character trait.

  
  


            Joker pulled himself into an upright position, splaying his legs, almost lewdly. "Well, it’s about time you came down from Metropolis to see us. The whole world is abuzz with gossip about your budding romance. Going to the carnival and winning a stuffed bear. Milkshakes at the corner drugstore. Candlelight dinners on top of Mt. Rushmore next to Teddy Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln. I can imagine the wholesome American fun you’d have on your dates.”

  
  


            “I’m not talking to you, Joker. It’s sad how much you want attention.” Clark smirked to himself. That would shut him right up.  _The freak thinks he can rattle me. He just wants to pull my pigtails._

  
  


            “How is the sex?” Joker asked as he stood up.

  
  


            Joker stared right at him, every word dripping with husky exhalation. Superman was shocked, at the sound in his ear.

  
  


            “How is the sex with Batman?” Joker asked; even though the Joker was shorter they were looking eye to eye now.

  
  


            Superman bit his tongue to keep from screaming his head off at the psychopath.

  
  


            “What, super _men_ don’t do that these days?” he asked.

  
  


            Clark turned pink and stared straight at his feet.

  
  


            “It’s good that our Dear Fruitbat found the only other being in the world that likes it so athletic,” he purred. “Let me guess, his favorite position is some insane choreography. Upside down in a cave in midair hanging from a rope.” Joker’s eyes sized him up, trailing up and down, as if measuring him for a giant super-harness.

  
  


            “You are so lucky that he’s strong enough so you don’t snap him down the middle, like a cooked chicken. Unless the sex is that boring for you. He is so little and insignificant, it must do nothing for you. Like loving a little rat or a mouse or one of those little brown bats with brittle wings spread out all over you. But he must love all those bruises you put on his body.” 

  
  


            “I would never try to bruise him. I don‘t… I--” He felt compelled to defend himself at the wild accusation.

  
  


            “I’ll bet you he has your superlogo burned into his ass with heat vision.” Joker licked his lips. “Meow.”

  
  


            Superman was reminded of the reddish imprint of a hand and its palm he saw last week on Bruce’s thigh, when he gave Bruce an open palmed swat on the leg for trying to steal all the blankets, and the sharp hiss Bruce gave. Bruce retorted by straddling him and giving him the worst blue balls he had in his life. Clark wondered if the color of the bruise had improved in the last few days. Bruce didn’t think a spanking was fun if it was a surprise. He and Bruce were always bumping into each other in some fashion.

  
  


            Superman tried to think about Bruce and not answer anymore of the man’s insane sex questions. That was private.

  
  


            “You’re a masochist’s dream. You could crack open his skull with your finger. What does he use on you when he wants to get kinky? A crow bar? A semi-automatic? A bulldozer? If you ever need to spice up the old boudoir you can always borrow my shit.”

  
  


            Superman groaned outwardly in disgust, though he tried to suppress it. This man was insane.

  
  


            Joker’s hands were cuffed to the bars of course. He struggled to look into his pocket for his pack of cigarettes, but his hands were shackled together, so while he could walk, and move his arms, he couldn’t do a thing with his hands. He tried to grab one with his teeth. He was a tenacious bastard.

  
  


            Superman unconsciously helped the man out. He took a few steps closer and reached through the bars, taking the cigarettes from his front pocket and handing him one. Superman was always ready to help. In seconds the Joker puffed away. Superman wondered if that was allowed, and how he lit the cigarette at all and so quickly. It was only then realized he had just helped the Joker.

  
  


            “Such a gentleman.” Joker held the pack out for Superman to take one, gesturing.

  
  


            “This is when I take a cigarette and it's poisoned and you say something schticky like 'Those things will kill you.' Or some off color joke about prison sodomy. And you shiv me in the neck..." Superman tried his hardest to brush the villain off.

  
  


            “The correct verb is shank, Superman.” He actually held one of the cigarettes out to him. Clark scowled.

  
  


            "What's it gonna do to you?” Joker looked at him wearily. “You’re invulnerable to poison. I’m tied up. What am I going to do to you? Break my ribs over your knee? You Superman. Me human.”

  
  


            Clark grabbed the pack to crush it to tobacco and realized it was candy. That old brand of gum that looked like cigarettes and puffed sugary smoke in the air. His hand got dirty with white powder. Of course they wouldn’t let an arsonist, mad scientist, and urban combat specialist around a pack of matches.

  
  


            Joker blew sugar dust in his face and laughed. He held the cigarette between two fingers and taunted him. "Freaking loser, taking gum from an old joker," the clown prince spat. "You should be thankful for that Bat out there, he's keeping your naïve ass alive." His dark eyes gleamed blacker than night. His teeth were clenched tight and angry, despite the smile. "You should give him a big old kiss,” his voice was so thick and husky, it was almost a growl, “and hug."

  
  


            The Joker stuck out his obscenely long pointed tongue around the end his cigarette, past poorly painted lips. His tongue was not red enough to match his lips. He swallowed the whole cigarette with a slight bulge to his throat, crude and pornographically obvious. “Or is that something that supermen can’t do either. Would it snap off his head? Would you squeeze his lungs out through his mouth?”

  
  


            The Joker's voice rang through the room. His strange voice. Always so full of vibrancy and life and menace. Everything was an exciting joke, and despite the condescending nature, might have at one point been a joy, an exciting and funny joke.

  
  


            Clark was reminded of Bruce all of a sudden, and by extension the Batman, trading quips over a dark rooftop as chaos and debris and bullets rained about them. His baritone voice low and sarcastic, rustling in his lower register, like a thundercloud, as the Joker tenor cackled with his voice tremulous, sharp, and vibrant, reaching high into the treble range and low into the bass. Like the crackle of pure lightning. Each voice worked together in a terrible rhythm.

  
  


            Someone up there must find it amusing, what Batman and Joker said to each other as they battled. Superman didn’t.

  
  


            "On the inside, one needs a hobby, and obsessing over the World's Finest Superheroes seems as good as any."

  
  


            “No one else is giving me a hard time. And it is none of your business, as I told you before,” Superman said.

  
  


            “Awfully sensitive. I’ll bet I was right about the Superman-shaped bruise on his ass right now. You must have really let him have it. Did he say something unflattering?”

  
  


            “I didn’t do it on purpose... He calls the shots. It‘s only fair. I--” Clark realized he was talking about his relationship with Batman with a crazy stranger. One who tried to kill both of them and anyone else he wanted on a whim. He felt somehow rooked. What was going on?

  
  


            Joker looked all the way through him, like he was a piece of gauze. His hate and anger burned, the light from his dark eyes like black flint, a dark focused laser.

  
  


            The Joker took out another candy cigarette, with his teeth that nestled in his pocket.. His voice got so soft it was like another person. He got a far off look in his eyes as he stopped focusing on Clark, and started reminiscing. "I don’t know how I get myself into these things. Do you ever ask yourself why these things happen? When we first began our relationship, I knew Batman… was experienced. He had been around the block. Even if it had been before he... became Batman.... he was a person who lived and loved and fought recklessly. Always struggling, always driving them away from him. Always biting back.   I knew I wouldn’t be his one and only villain.” He smirked. “There have been so many. Cute names, cute gimmicks, my dearest enemies." He sighed, and then laughed through his nose. "Poison Ivy, Two-Face, the Killer Pharaoh. A man who is fat and awful called Penguin. What kind of villain is that? They all can’t wait to get at you, too. It would make them so happy to see you both dead. The triumph to their little criminal careers. The death of the World’s Finest."

  
  


            Joker finally returned his attention to Superman. "But I don't have to stand up to you. How long are you going to tolerate it all? How long can a person like you be with a person like him and not resent it all? You resent him and you resent yourself. You’re trying to turn a predator into some ridiculous house pet?” he asked. “The Bat is mine."

  
  


            Superman stared at the villain dumbfounded.

  
  


            “Batman is mine.” Joker repeated.

  
  


            "No,” Superman actually tried to argue. As if he was beginning to believe this insane drugged up clown had a point. And that point was so powerful they were going to have an argument. “I don't think he likes you like that way. He hates you," he said. “You are a terrible person.” He was actually trying to defend his position, instead of ignoring the creep.

  
  


            Joker motioned him over to the bars, still a little weak from the injection. Superman stood stock-still. The Joker’s white bony fingers seemed stark in the shadow. Superman did not want to get trapped. He stared at the man.

  
  


            “He doesn’t love you,” Superman said. “He loves me. He told me he loves me. So you have to-” Clark was cut off as he heard a startling steel thud.

  
  


            The Joker’s shackled hands wrapped around the bars, and he lifted himself up right in Clark’s face. Once he stood, he let go of the bars and paced to the end of his chain, testing its length. At the same time he stared at Superman and began to stare. The Joker stroked his own cheek, the other hand hanging limply as its neighbor stroked his white skin. His finger stroked a short trail from the perverse dimple on his cheek and the vicious scar, over and over again, until a little red from those lips eked into the white. It turned the lead white paint into a mess with streaks of foul pink, like a blood infection. 

  


They stood staring at each other, sizing up the threat.

  
  


            Joker spoke first. "There is nothing more I want in this life than to hurt him." The Joker came close. Inappropriately close. He could smell some kind of shaving cream or lotion that was usually alcoholic, and cheap but sweet. The muscles in the Joker’s face twitched and tensed in terrible erratic patterns. A short scan with his x-ray vision indicated extensive nerve damage in his face. It made it easy for Joker to appear to be smiling. Anyone with eyes could see tension in the back or the shoulders, but most tension was carried in the face. Superman sensed the muscles in his cheek and jaws were tense. They twitched. They must have hurt.

  
  


            What did it feel like to never stop smiling?

  
  


            "What can I do, though? Kill him. Tease that little bratty kid and throw him off a building. Get my dumb as fuck girlfriend to chase him around with a death ray or something," Joker said, his teeth gritting, maybe the only evidence that he wanted to frown, the only indication that he wanted to scream out in pain.

  
  


            This was taking too long. Superman felt cold. He shook his head. "I’m really _so_ sad for you, Joker," he tried to say blandly, with some sort of compassion for the man, but his voice was laced with irrational anger. He hated that the Joker was bragging about all the horrible things he did to Bruce. Ugh. He hated people who bragged. “You are _so_ unlucky.” Clark tried to glare at him, but he found himself backing away from the bars. “Who would have thought it was so hard to be a tacky comedian mass murderer.”

  
  


            "Shut up, Superman. You’re the one that really hurts him. You really wanna get that Bat? You get him in here." He awkwardly tried to point at his heart, but his hands were constrained by the shackles. “Where everything is still weak and young. He’s still like a baby in there. The carpet doesn’t match the drapes. He’s a mess on the inside. You just see his mind, or his body.” The shackles were too tight and he laughed at that, staring at his useless hands like a drunken man. Joker shambled and limped towards Superman as he tried to back away from the Joker, “You don’t see what’s going on in the heart.” Joker’s fingers were brushing against his cape. Superman stopped running.

  
  


            "Now I wonder what super stunt you pulled on old Bats to get him to open that old rusty gearbox in his chest. He doesn't have a sense of humor. Maybe it was just an illusion of the physical intimacy.” He said those words so slow, Clark could feel them over his cheek, rife with heat and moisture. “You might think of him as a genius, but down at the heart of it... he is a bit of a brute." His human-colored tongue skated over his lips. "He’s a physical, urgent creature, begging to be tamed."

  
  


            "He has a great sense of humor!" Clark barked at him. "He just thinks you are a freak.” He didn't want this man talking about Bruce. Clark was stepping away, perhaps in fear. "And he... he loves me. So you stop talking about him. Or I-"

  
  


            "Really, then? I don't know how I will sleep." He cried a crocodile tear. He leaned into the bars. Stretched out his back, somehow catlike. “Knowing he doesn’t love me. Boo hoo hoo. How will I ever live without glory of his bountiless affection?” _Bountiless wasn’t even a word._

  
  


            "Is everything always a joke to you?" Superman’s voice was losing its angry edge, sounding more upset now; he wanted to leave this room forever.

  
  


            "I like to laugh," Joker said. "It beats the alternative." His eyes seemed to shine white as they slipped around in the dark, the dark brown melting into the background. "Where is that big happy grin of yours, Mein Ubermensch? What, doesn’t the thought of going home to happy Fruitbat make your heart swell up with glee?” He gaped. “Is it because you know I am not bullshitting you and all of it is a damn lie?”

  
  


            Joker leaned in as if to tell him a secret. Clark was transfixed, as Joker bent over to stare at him. "It won't make much of a difference if you are here or not. Here, there, in his Batcave, in his bed, no matter to me, no matter to him.” Joker‘s eyes gleamed. “He's still good old Bats. Angry, full of wrath and arrogance, vengeful, and with no sense of fun, no sense of style, no spirit of giving, no mercy, no heart. He will always be Batman first.”

  
  


            Superman shook his head. "Batman is a good man. He risks himself more than anyone I have ever met for the good of us all. We are superheroes. It is our duty to put the needs of the many above our own needs. I understand that he needs to protect the weak. I know why he needs to protect himself. I can forgive that. Me and him, we’re new together. I don‘t expect everything at once. I--"

  
  


            "Really? He will _always_ be Batman first. There will never be a single moment in all your dreary personal history to come that will have more meaning to him than that, nothing would make him feel like I did. One night he will forget your anniversary and not come home because he is chasing me down in a cold alley. One day you’ll feel compelled to adopt ugly foreign children and he’ll tell you no, because he can’t keep them safe. I’m already the reason he decided never to physically procreate children of his own, and makes him fill his Batcave with little orphan waifs. He’ll never get a kitty cat or a puppy dog, fearing I’d poison them or kidnap them.”

  
  


            Joker leered at Clark obscenely; the edge of his tongue slipping in and out of his mouth as he spoke; his darkness and fine features were hypnotic and terrible. “One night, you two are going to be in bed. You’ll be trying so hard to please him, and that signal will go off in the night sky, because I felt like seeing him again. And he is going to leave you in that bed alone. Because what can you really do for him?”

  
  


            Clark felt weak with anger. Joker lowered his voice for emphasis and whispered in his ear. “You know, when it rains and all his old injuries swell up, I’ll bet you’ve see the one on his knee, you know the one with the jagged scar on it, and you rub your hand over it and he just melts in relief. You know which one. It’s probably one of your go-to moves when you want to get him in the sack.”

  
  


            How did Joker know? How did he know Bruce’s body so well? Clark was jealous and jilted and angry.

  
  


            “That was me. I took one of those pretty swords. I find it so funny that he likes to pretend he’s Japanese when he’s nothing but a silly little WASP.” He chuckled to himself. “I had two swords. The long one and the short one. I took the big long steel. And I CUT him. I plunged it all the way through the leg and into his ankle until he was pinned on his knees to the ground. And I pulled the short one in and out, in and out, wherever I could touch.” The Joker opened his collar. “Is it hot in here?”

  
  


            “You… are… just… crazy.” Superman tried to repeat the words again, hoping they would mean something. He slowly tried to control his strength, trying not to kill anyone or melt anyone.

  
  


            Clark should have realized there was something unusual going on as the Joker opened his collar as he spoke. It was an awkward angle with the shackles but he managed somehow. Fingers toying with the buttons as he languished over the images of violence “He took this little cannon grappling thing and he was screaming,” the Joker tore off the third button,   “And pressed against my chest right here.” The Joker pointed to the scars on his chest. His chest was flesh colored compared to his hands. Except for a blast burn with five fiery points. There were burns and scars in the shape of hooks and batarangs in his flesh. Superman was repulsed and disgusted by the vivid eidetic memory of pain, how the Batman and the Joker remembered the pain that they could caused each other. He could hear Bruce’s voice telling the stupid stories behind each scar on his body and pretending he was interested in each one, each story worse to Clark than a wound of his own. Clark was furious at the terrible communication between Batman and all his enemies carved in his skin.

  
  


            “You know, Batman gives as good as he gets. After that little date, we both couldn‘t get out of bed for more than a week.” Joker almost reached out to touch him before Clark backed away again.

  
  


            “Shut up.” Clark’s fingers buckled the steel as he pressed against the bars and in an impotent gesture twisted the wall, like it was a silk curtain and not iron bars. “No more.” At each word his nails dug deeper into the cage. Having all of his insecurity and fear exposed caused every muscle in his body to tense up. He was so mad he didn’t even know whom he wanted to hurt. Bruce, the Joker, or himself. But he was going to try to--

  
  


            Clark snapped to attention.

  
  


            “Thank you for the assist, Ubermensch. But I think I can get out of this cell myself.” Joker kicked at the wall. The great steel frame fell off its hinges. “Christ, you’re a strong one. Now, I’m safer in here. What is wrong with you, jealous asshole?” He buttoned up his shirt one-handed. “After all, you’re the one he loves. You’re his raison’ d’etre. You’re the one he goes home with every night. He does say ‘I love you’ every single day?” The Joker gave him his brightest, cruelest smile. “You certainly are the luckiest guy I know.”

  
  


            “He doesn’t have to,” Superman said. The steel gate hung crookedly on its hinges. He reached down to try to put the steel frame of the bars back, but it had come down crooked, hanging at an awkward angle. “I just-- I just know.”

  
  


            Joker laughed at his expense. "I suppose that is cold comfort. Maybe it will make it all the more bearable that an ass like you will cry like a little jealous bitch when you have to watch him die one day. When I kill him. Has to happen one of these days. I‘m not getting any younger," Joker said. "I'll take care of him. It's gonna be me who takes him out of this life," he said. "Someone has to...."   And Joker's eyes locked in on Clark's eyes. They remained there. "Take care of him."

  
  


            Clark froze completely, his expectations and mind in tatters as the Clown picked away at every fear and anxiety in his big swollen head. He wasn’t going to break the bars on the cage for Joker, and let the man run free.

  
  


            “Nice try. You’re just lying,” Clark lied to himself, and to the Joker. “You’re just trying to get me mad. You didn’t mean any of it.”

  
  


            Joker walked closer, one of his hands on Superman's uniform. "I’m so glad I’m not lying for once.” Joker smiled at him, his fingers tracing his destroyed cheek all the way down to one of the scars from Batman down his chest around his collarbone. The line he traced against his skin turned pink as the Joker rubbed it away.

  
  


            The Joker looked up at Clark, his body thinner and smaller than Bruce’s. His nostrils flared; Clark stared him in the eyes. “Why don't you... give him something from me?" the Joker asked.

  
  


            Clark stared at the Joker as he came close enough to grab him, with a new purpose in mind other than the psychological games. Almost faster then Clark could process it, the Joker grabbed him with his freed hand. Clark realized this too late.

  
  


            The Joker was no longer shackled.

  
  


            Both white hands came right through the bars, white fingers against his face. The Joker's lips pressed against his. Clark inhaled him without realizing it, as the mad clown stepped into the kiss, grabbing him by his hair.  Clark closed his eyes, as the Joker’s flashing tongue tried to work past the defenses of Clark’s mouth. Clark couldn’t breathe. The broken steel creaked as he tried to pull away, without ripping his head off like a daisy head from its stem. The Joker broke away first.

  
  


            Because the bastard was tackled to the wall. Batman had Joker’s arm pinned quickly, but Joker kicked him. The Batman shouted. Even with his hands in broken shackles, the clown still could grapple with Batman. He kicked at his stomach and face. The fight went quickly; all the orderlies rushed in, from escorting Arnie. All they saw was a blur of rainbow colors and black on the floor, too chaotic for mortals to touch. Panicked, Clark ripped through the bars, tossing them to the ground, trying to protect Bruce. “Stop.”

  
  


            The Joker used the jagged end of the shiv to cut Batman’s cheek. The flurry ended as expected. Batman held the clown in a chokehold, sleeper hold. “I got this, Superman. Don’t you worry. The Joker is under control. That explosion was just a cover so he could get out of his cell. He’s making a go at an escape.”

  
  


            "Well, Bats. I was just handing your dear fiancé your wedding present," he said. “I hope you don’t hold it against me that it is so late. It’s so gauche that I forgot.” He tried to break free from his hold. “Why didn’t you tell me you eloped? I could have been your maid of honor if you had done a big church wedding like your Papa had wanted.”

  
  


            "Thanks for the courtesy. There is no one else I would have wanted to call dead last." Batman revealed nothing in his face. The orderlies took control. They put him an arm lock and held him in place.

  
  


            Despite the Joker being immobilized and under control, Batman wasn’t done with him. The titans stood face to face. Batman was close enough to smell his sugary gum. They were too close.

  
  


            Joker fake sniffled. “Uh-oh, Daddy’s home,” Joker said. “I’m shaking in my boots. If he doesn‘t want to play, take him out of the ring. You brought him into my world, Batman.”

  
  


            “You should pick on someone your own size, Joker. You really are pathetic. Miss talking to people? It must get so lonely with no one to torment. No one to belittle. Just you and yourself.” The hollow glint that covered his eyes in the cowl disguised something darker then normal, but Batman had his usual expression of cold focus.

  
  


            Joker made an attempt to kick him in the groin.

  
  


            “You seem very dense today, Joker. He is mine. Do not fuck with him. Or do we have to go over this again?” Batman said coldly.

  
  


            Joker pretended not to hear him. “Soupie just has to develop a sense of humor. Don’t worry, he might be a little dim but he’ll get the hang of it. Fabulous kisser.”

  
  


            “That is not what you are supposed to say, Joker.“ Batman shook his head. Then like a lightning bolt he backhanded the mental patient. “Repeat after me. I will not fuck around with Superman.”

  
  


            “I will not fuck--”

  
  


            Batman punched him in the stomach. He inspected the shiv he had wrestled from the Joker. It was so sharp it cut away at his rubber gloves. Batman looked as if he got pricked.

  
  


Batman held the shattered metal to the Clown’s throat.

  
  


            “--Around with Superman. I will not FUCK around with Superman,” the Joker repeated. The clown coughed as the punch knocked out his wind and a little blood from where he bit his cheek. Batman disengaged.

  
  


            “We’re getting too old for this shit.” Batman rubbed his shoulder, where he had tackled the clown. He turned away from the Joker, looking over his shoulder. “Stop being a pain in the ass.”

  
  


            Joker tried to catch his breath. "All those days working on the best shiv I made in my life. Using nothing but the edge of the zipper on my mattress and a USB drive, and the first person I see is a Man of Steel," he said from the floor. “He bends the whole blade with his skin.”

  
  


            Batman inspected the shiv, and now the damaged glove, and possibly his cut skin. Clark couldn’t see over there and was too rattled to use his powers. It took a few seconds to catch his bearing. It’s fine. Clark used his normal sight. Batman didn’t prick his finger all the way through. The blade of the shiv was twisted and bent but it would have killed anyone else.

  
  


            "Look at how funny that thing looks now..." And the Joker burst into laughter.

  
  


            Clark was too stunned to speak. He watched Batman move away from the Joker. His whole body was stiff armed and light-footed in his jackboots, like a cat on the prowl. He kept his eyes on Joker the whole time.

  
  


            Batman looked into Joker's eyes, didn't blink, didn't look away. Predator to Predator, on some common ground. "Isn't that funny?" Joker's laugh descended into wild chaos.

  
  


            Clark shivered everywhere. Batman didn't look at him; his eyes had other things to look at. "If you want to join us in the real world there is some damage control to deal with, Superman." Batman didn't look at him. “That must have been some kiss there.” Batman joked to his partner.

  
  


            Batman was still looking at Joker. He even turned his head to look back as they left the room.

  
  
            Clark had never felt so alone in his life as he walked out of that room.

  


It was pre-morning in Wayne Manor some three hours later.

  
  


The Joker’s attempted escape from Arkham was too stressful to put either of them in the mood to do anything but sit down and stare at the wall ‘til their frazzled nerves let them sleep.

  
  


Clark would be perfectly fine after his experience. The Joker had picked the wrong victim. He had stabbed seven people that year in Arkham, and this one would have been a fatal attack, if Batman hadn’t foiled Joker, or rather Clark hadn’t fumbled his way into the situation and was incapable of being shanked. Clark was shocked at how close Joker came to killing him if he were a person. Holes were in his cape and in his outfit, along the neck and of course the logo over his chest. He hadn't even felt it as his mind was twisted and turned by the Joker’s head games, and the crush of his lips.

  
  


Lipstick was another matter entirely. It just hurt to scrub it away anymore. It looked like he was wearing it still. Maybe his invulnerable skin was chaffing and rubbing off. Lipstick did not come off with just soap and water. But the red skin turned his stomach, at the memory of his heart racing and his eyes closing and…

  
  


He wondered if sugared dust particles had worked all the way into his tongue microscopically, as he could taste that kiss over and over again. Clark might be being stupid and melodramatic, but had the weird suspicion that Bruce would never want to kiss him again, just thinking where Clark’s mouth had been. Bruce was so protective and possessive. He wanted to crawl in a hole and die forever.

  
  


 _“Thanks to the Joker, I’m used goods. Oh, woe is me. Now Bruce shall call off our marriage, and shame me before Mama and the town.”_

  
  


Bruce was on his couch in the media room designed in the French country style. He was watching the projection TV against the cheery yellow wainscoting, in an undignified sprawl, one leg over the couch as he watched Mel Brooks. It was undignified but somehow hot and it stretched out his muscles. Lately Bruce sprawled when he sat. He didn’t even cross his legs. As if his whole body was so exhausted he couldn’t sit up. Batman had menacing and severe posture. Clark really wondered if it meant that his injuries had caused permanent damage over the years

  
  


Bruce’s face was impassive, stern, teeth grinding at an invisible pebble. Bruce's face, frequently blank of emotions, had still always attracted Clark’s attention. He liked that hard jaw and that nose full of character and that sharply furrowed brow. He even once thought out of all his features he liked Bruce’s handsome face, the best of all. But he had been wrong about that.

  
  


Once Clark could tolerate being around Bruce or Batman for more than one minute, the things to love about him were infinite.

  
  


Clark approached cautiously. He could smell a fight in the air. He wasn’t sure that he would try to stop it either. He didn’t understand these conflicting feelings of aggression and vulnerability. It wasn’t normal for him to be so confused. He didn’t know if he should beg Bruce for forgiveness or throw him out the window. But he didn’t like the silence.

  
  


“Want to go to the bedroom and reconfirm our undying passion in the way only lovers can?” Clark muttered under his breath.

  
  


“Yeah, I’ll race you there,” Bruce said, eyes fluttering shut. He was half asleep anyway. He should have been fully asleep but something was probably bothering him. The Musical Inquisition number splashed across the screen, causing Bruce’s eyes to focus a little. 

  
  


“I think this would be insensitive to Jewish people and witches,” Clark said.

  
  


"Yeah, but it’s funny," Bruce said.

  
  


That struck him as odd. Clark turned over and looked at him. "Then why aren't you laughing?"

  
  


Bruce shrugged. "Dunno. Tired."

  
  


"You know, you don't really laugh a lot,” Clark said.

  
  


“Nope. Not me.” Bruce was not in the mood to talk and had fallen into his default mode of utter compliance. In normal circumstances Clark should have used this to his advantage to do something a little raunchier in bed than normal, like giving Bruce a chance to spank him.

  
  


His judgment was poor tonight.

  
  


“But. You ARE funny.”

  
  


“I guess.” Bruce wasn’t in the mood to talk. He wasn’t going to get a thing out of him.

  
  


“I just find that ironic,” Clark said in leading tone full of accusation.

  
  


Bruce sighed. “God, I hate when you say that,” he said. “It only means you want to insult something I did. What did I do wrong now?”

  
  


“I’m not saying you _did_ anything wrong. I’m just saying it is ironic,” Clark said

  
  


Bruce rolled his eyes at him. “Ironic, huh, Clark?” Bruce might not have superpowers, but he knew when someone was pushing his buttons. He knew a losing battle, so he tried to retreat.

  
  


Clark continued, “It’s ironic. You make jokes and jabs. You call me names, and I know you have great timing, saucy wit and material. You could go on for days and days delighting everyone in the room with stories and riddles and knock knock jokes."

  
  


“Whatever. I’m watching this.” He started channel surfing that very second. Which is hilarious to Clark because Bruce generally hates TV. And to use it as an excuse not to talk is a first in their relationship. Bruce looked at him like he was crazy before he pretended to be interested in skin cream on QVC. “So I don’t laugh?”

  
  


“You rarely laugh. I think it’s creepy,” Clark said.

  
  


"People think you’re crazy if you laugh at every little thing. I think it’s... It’s annoying. I think that is creepy.”

  
  


Clark looked at him. “I just think it’s creepy that you don’t laugh when something is funny. That is what ‘funny’ means, you laugh.”

  
  


“Maybe it’s not that funny. I don’t know.”

  
  


“Well, then don’t laugh. And don’t, like, add commentary about how you would laugh if you weren‘t weird.”

  
  


Bruce rolled his eyes. “You’re the creepy one. Smiling all the time is the creepiest thing ever.”

  
  


“I don’t even smile that much,” Clark said. “And I laugh and I smile the exact amount of a normal person should smile and laugh. I even double checked.”

  
  


“Except you laugh like young Santa Claus,” Bruce said standing up.

  
  


“You have no right.” Clark said “YOU snigger like a moron, like someone letting air out a balloon.” 

  
  


“I don’t snigger.”

  
  


“Like an evil little cat girl.” He put his hand on Bruce’s shoulder. Bruce winced.

  
  


Clark could hold Bruce in place one handed, he had an annoying habit of doing that when Bruce was winning an argument. As if somewhere deep inside if he couldn’t make Bruce listen he could at least make him stick around. One day he would get the courage and kiss Bruce quiet, like in some bad movie, but now he didn’t want Bruce to hide in the bathroom.

  
  


“Let me go,” Bruce said. Most of their fights ended like this. Clark getting touchy and holding Bruce down. Bruce feeling uncomfortable and smacking him “Clark. I mean it.” He said still giving him one more warning 

  
  


“What are you going to do kick me in the face? For holding your shoulder?”

  
  


            “Why would I bother?” Bruce shouted. “”I’ll probably break a goddamn toe on your face.”

  
  


Clark let go. Bruce gave him that “ _Why-did-I-ever-sleep-with-this-man-in-the-first-place?_ ” look as he rubbed his shoulder. “Too far, Clark.”

  
  


“I’m sorry. Is it bruised?” Clark looked at his shoulder.

  
  


Bruce grumbled, “No. I’m not a wuss. You touched my shoulder. But it could be if you keep holding me around like that,” Bruce snapped at him, through the pain and frustration. “I was sorry the second I did it.” The apology should be worthless as Bruce snarled that as well, but it wasn’t somehow. Classic Bruce. You couldn’t believe him if he was cold and level headed; he was most sincere when angry and unguarded.

  
  


“Don’t yell at me, stupid,” Clark’s disparaging epithets had regressed around thirty years.

  
  


“Because you…” Bruce grumbled “Creepy alien.”

  
  


“You’re creepy.” Clark said.

  
  


Clark and Bruce stopped shouting and stared at the TV, creepy and mad and not kissing and not laughing. But somehow still in love. It really stretches the imagination that people can exist like that.

  
  


After what they had been through together, he didn't understand why such a tiny thing was setting him on edge. Bruce, only sitting there and not laughing. Clark should hope he would never ever hear a laugh so cold and mad again as he had last night in that awful room, with those awful people. Clark should hope he’d never hear another witty comeback or a single variance of tone. Joker had scared the crap out of him, attacked him, tried to kill him and... then did something worse. He made him see the edges of the truth.

  
  


“I’m sorry I hit you.”

  
  


“You didn’t hit me, you tapped me. I’d be dead if you hit me. You grabbed me,” Bruce said.

  
  


Bruce hit him with a fist to his shoulder, so he would pay attention. It would take the full force of his training to hit him like that. It got Clark’s attention. "Don’t be a wuss. I'm not mad at what happened. Joker ambushed you, only instead of a bomb….” He scoffed, “Don't mope."

  
  


"I just.... I dunno." Clark thought he left relationships with women to stop talking about his inner feelings. He didn't even know what he was feeling. Why, of all things, Bruce's face was making him angry, when the Joker had tongue-humped his face in public.

  
  


“For some people, dealing with sexual harassment is harder than others. You are a textbook case. It’s a matter of social psychology. It‘s making me crazy to see you get affected by this. I don’t want to see you like this.”

  
  


“How do you think it makes me feel?” Clark said. “He would have escaped if you weren’t there. Or I would have killed him.”

  
  


Bruce continued quietly. He didn't even move his eyes from the TV. "The Joker is a villain.”

  
  


“So? He wasn‘t doing anything. I mean, he’s locked in a cage with shackles. He‘s just this deranged guy… but--”

  
  


“No, Clark. You don’t get it. He isn’t just ‘some deranged guy.’ The Joker is a nightmare. He lives to manipulate people. To make them scared, to make them weak, just for a laugh. Just because he can." He didn't look at the screen. He looked at Clark. “He…” The Batman was struggling to keep Bruce quiet. “He’s always up to something. He’s always got something in his crazy head that he is trying to do. He doesn’t have room for anything else.”

  
  


Clark wondered to himself. Maybe he was lonely, maybe he was jealous. Maybe he…

  
  


“It’s hard, because regular people always get distracted from what they want out of life by something they need in their life. A regular person isn’t supposed to only want or need one thing,” Bruce said. “A regular person has to have someone that they care about. More than just a… I mean, you know how it is…” Bruce looked like he was ashamed of something that he would never tell Clark. Something about how Batman was never going to be a regular person. That he could comprehend the level of compulsion of a serial killer. “He doesn’t care about anything, and I don’t think he ever will.”

  
  
"I used to feel sorry for him, too," Clark said. "Now, if I saw him again, I might run." Clark licked his lips again. "Psycho."   
  


"He doesn't bother Metropolis. I'll have your back, if we see him again." Bruce may have turned to him. Bruce’s voice sounded unreasonably annoyed, and Clark still didn’t feel like looking him in the eye. Bruce commanded attention as he finally dispelled the anger from his voice. "I am not mad at you. I’m barely mad at him. It’s meaningless. You shouldn’t let it get to you.”

  
  


"You better not be mad at me." Clark half-growled, almost serious, "I didn't do anything to you. I am the one who--" He crossed his arms.

  
  


"No, you did,” he said. “What you did was not trust me. You don’t trust me to like act humane. I would never get mad at you over that," he said, channel surfing, the sound cutting in and out sharply.

  
  


“Well _good_.” Clark said, not willing to give up his anger, even though it was impotent.

  
  


“Good, then you can stop being pissy.”

  
  


"I'm _not_ ," Clark said. "You’re the one being pissy. You know I trust you!"

  
  


Bruce turned off the TV. "You are not the first person he sexually harassed. It’s not the end of the Goddamn world." Bruce looked at him. He said it flat out. Perhaps Bruce thought it would make Clark feel better having some kind of confidante. Maybe he had never told anyone else.

  
  


“Did he ever sexually harass you, Bruce?” Clark asked, even though the Joker had given him the answer last night. He didn’t want Bruce to go through all these feelings alone.

  
  


"He does that,” Bruce whispered. “He did it to me and he hates me more than anyone in his miserable life. He kissed me," Bruce said. "He wants to see me dead. The people at Arkham can't explain it. Maybe his mood stabilizer cocktail and cranial trauma has damaged his impulse control. Maybe he's a latent homosexual.” Bruce’s brow furrowed. “Who cares? I don’t…” Bruce worked hard to articulate his feelings. “Now he put you through it, too,” he said, “It just makes my skin crawl. He probably gave you a nickname, too. Probably said that you two were meant to be together and made all these disgusting… things. About how you just belong together, and trying to make it like he is telling the truth.”

  
  


Clark touched Bruce to try to dissipate some of his confusion and anger. It was almost touching how naïve Bruce was about the effect he had on people. Bruce let him touch him this time.

  
  


“No. No. He always lies. He lies because he thinks it’s funny to fuck with me. I hate him." Bruce hid his face. “I hate him so much.” He slammed his hand against the couch. "I don't care that he kissed you, Clark, I love you like crazy." He grasped the hand on his knee for some kind of comfort. This “I love you” was not elegant or rehearsed, it was ragged and frustrated, from the deepest place inside of his partner.

  
  


"I don't care that he kissed me, either," Clark whispered. Looking at all Bruce had been through alone all these years, Clark changed his mind; he was sure that when he crawled in a hole to die of embarrassment that Bruce could come with him. All Bruce had to do was ask to come in the hole with him, and it would be nice for someone to bring snacks.

  
  


“’Cause I know it wasn't a good kiss," Bruce said quietly as he looked out at the skyline. "He tastes like blood and make-up."

  
  


Clark began to understand why he was mad at Bruce, how he couldn’t share everything with Bruce.

  
  


Clark knew, if the Joker ever had kissed Batman, it was a good kiss. Even the kiss Joker had given him just that night had been amazing, but the source soured his iron stomach. The Joker may have been teasing Clark, but he would have kissed Bruce with the full force of his passion. Clark was so sick of his own insecurity about Bruce.

  
  


Bruce trusts him, Bruce knows him. Bruce told him a secret; Bruce would protect him if Joker came near him. Bruce proved himself a worthy partner and lover in every sense.  

  


Bruce looked at the television again. "I don't care that he kissed you. But I am going to make him pay for what he did to you, Clark," he said. Bruce looked up at him with human fury in his eyes, even though his face was beautiful as it always was. “I’ll take care of him.”

  
  


"I could care less about _anything_ that maniac does. If you care so little about him, why can't you tear your eyes away from him when he and I are in the same room?" Clark asked him honestly. “And why can’t you just let it go? Why can’t we just go on with our lives and be happy?”

  
  


Bruce stared at him, confused. "Well..."

  
  


Clark never in his life felt more alien than he did now. Bruce made Clark think about his time today at Arkham. For the first time he remembered his father’s words with a real awareness of the pain behind them.  _They are a good people of great potential._ Humans were so wonderful, their keen minds and fiery spirit, the stubborn will, the quirky neurosis. Their achievement, their hearts.

  
  


Then in that cell Clark learned something else. 

  
  


Maybe he learned how human nature could completely bury everything of value in the human character in the flash of passion and instinct. The desire to hurt the one who hurt you, to push pain away, to destroy your enemy.

  
  


The Joker reminded him of Bruce in that mad terrible instant.

  
  


Bruce took in a deep breath and lied to Clark, hid a part of himself. "He probably wanted to attack. You have to watch out for him. He’s tricky… You can’t take your eyes off of him.

  
  


Clark stared at the black TV screen. "Why did you stare at him like that?" Clark wasn’t sure he had the strength to let Bruce off the hook for this one.

  
  


Bruce turned around and held Clark’s hands, stared him in the eye. Clark could see disappointment and shame in his eyes, in that beautiful face, still whole thanks to the grace of God. The TV, the weary purple sky not even daring to be black any longer, and the sullen tiredness that lead them to argue was slipping away. Everything was quiet and real.

  
  


"Because the Joker is much hotter than you are, Clark."

  
  


Clark gasped.

  
  


"Sex. Incarnate." Bruce licked his lips.

  
  


And as Clark was stunned quiet over what Bruce just told him, Bruce's face lit up in a sharp smile so reluctant it looked like it hurt, and laughed the softest laughter Clark ever heard. Barely audible at first, as he laughed his shoulders shook up and down.

  
  


“You are a bitch, Bruce Wayne.” Clark could barely keep himself from crying laughing and losing control. Tears squeezed out as his face contorted.

  
  


Bruce’s face looked like it was going to explode. It was so red before the real laugh finally escaped his lips. Clark fell over laughing and they couldn’t even sit up for several minutes.

  
  


"Yeah, you were right. The kiss was good. The guy’s sex magic." Clark smiled. Bruce was laughing so hard it hurt. He held Clark tight in a hug.

  
  


"Not better than this," Bruce said. Bruce kissed him, still unable to end the laugh as he did, possibly making it less than the best kiss they ever had. He kept giggling Clark tried to deepen his kiss.

  
  


It wasn’t the kiss that made Clark feel better for once. Clark was healed by the sound of Bruce’s redemptive confused laughter. Bruce laughed at himself. It was like a balm from heaven, hearing Bruce laugh like that. The kernels of terrible truth he had seen exploded in a burst of humor. Bruce baptized himself in his soft, shy, and pained laugh. Bruce hadn’t meant anything. He had only forgotten that someone really loved him and that things could be nice in this world.  

  
  


And somehow Clark knew, Bruce, bless him, would try his hardest not to forget that again.

  
  


Bruce held him. "Don't ever listen to what the Joker says... you just learn to filter out what is important. I can’t stand to see you like this."

  
  


Clark listened to Bruce’s heartbeat as they sat side by side. Bruce rested his head on his shoulder.

  
  


Clark filtered through echoing sound bites of madness, the things he heard and felt over the last few hours.

  
  


 _You're there or you’re not, in his bed it doesn't matter. Doesn’t matter to him._

  
  


 _I don’t mean to bruise him. I will never hurt him._

  
  


 _He must tell you he loves you every day._

  
  


 _Would he snap in half?_

  
  


 _He’s gonna leave you._

  
  


 _He doesn’t have to…_

  
  


 _(laughter)_

  
  


 _I love you._

  
  


 _He loves me._

  
  


“I love you,” Bruce grumbled; he might as well call him a name afterwards it was so frustrated. But this declaration was unadorned and honest. It almost hurt.

  
  


"I think he told me... to take care of you." He drew Bruce in for a hug, and Bruce finally allowed himself to sleep.

  


  


  



End file.
